I keep sitting down to write about the last few months and somehow the words all seem too big, clumsy and wrong. I don’t have the lines of the story yet, and I don’t have the last chapters resolved, and it seems like this season has really been a journey whose words are still taking shape in the light and dark muddle of things. And I’ll be honest: I’ve been tired. Tired past my bones, tired in my spirit. I’ve been wanting to share a bit of my experience through all of this, and on reflecting on it, I’m not sure I can properly convey all the strength and grace my mom has shown though all of this - how much she’s had to go through - and so as I write this all out, I’m trying not to speak for her, say too much or summarize her experiences as my own.
In the summer, my mom was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer. In the fall, she moved in with me to begin treatment, and on Thanksgiving we almost lost her. I am so happy to write that she’s doing better - there’s a journey left ahead, but she’s been able to spend more time back home, we take little walks around my neighbourhood, and her and my dad have even adopted an “emotional support cat” named Jasper.
During all of this, I’ve taken on less sessions and I’ve been so grateful to my clients who’ve been so flexible and understanding with my longer editing turnaround, rescheduling sessions, and slower response times. I stopped booking new sessions around October, but I’m slowly opening up my availability, while also creating + forming big plans for recraft in 2020, as well as doing more therapy work. Lots of new stuff coming next year - but I’m approaching it all slowly, steadily, and with a deeper recognition of the power of my voice in the world and an understanding for self care.
This year I’ve been working on my self care stories, and I had no idea when I began them that self care would be such a meaningful and poignant part of 2019. I knew that self care wasn’t always easy, but it’s hard. For any of you out there for caring for others, anyone feeling heavy about taking needed time to rest when someone you love is hurting, know that caring for yourself is caring for others. Burn out is real. Take time to walk by the river. Take time to sit in your backyard. Take time to have a slow coffee on a long morning and listen to the rain fall out the window, ask for support, find a therapist you resonate with - it’s ok to not be ok, and it’s ok to ask for help.
For those of you navigating the medical system in any way: keep asking questions. Keep making phone calls. Don’t be afraid to push - kindly, gently, directly. We are all in this world doing our best to navigate it, and not many of us know what’s next, or how long a waitlist is, or how long is too long to wait for treatment. Even for me, coming from a (very small) background with Northern Health, there was so much I didn’t know, didn’t understand, felt anxious about. There were days I sat at my table and made 8 hours worth of phone calls. There were times I called my mom’s pharmacist so much they knew the sound of my voice. There have been times when I’ve felt so angry, frustrated, full of grief, anxious - completely lost in a system that often seems to work without human kindness, without the awareness of how wonderful my mom is - How needed she is, how much of a light in the world she is, and how desperately care was needed.
I am happy to say that my mom now has a wonderful team working with her - it took time for things to get moving, but now that they are going forward, I feel incredibly grateful for a thousand small kindnesses: how her ER dr always remembers her, phone calls from her oncologist checking in, incredible CGH paramedics, the team of pharmacists that answer all my anxious questions, the gentle kindness of BCCA nurses and the nursing hotline, how the morning after my mom was placed in ICU her good friend met me at the nursing desk and just wrapped me up with love. There are a thousand more kindnesses I could mention: care packages, prayer shawls, muffin drop offs, soup made with love, check ins, long talks, all of the people who have made space and offered support. My cousin Melissa even came down for just over a week to help out, which was so needed. Jamie has stayed up all night with me, helping to care for my mom after rough chemo rounds. I couldn’t have done any of this without him. My family has been so good at checking in with each other and supporting one another. In all of this, I know we all feel very lucky and very loved.
My mom is spending more time back home now with my dad and her little cat - the stairs at their place are still tough, but I know how good it is to be home and feeling cozy. During chemo rounds she comes back here, but with every round I’ve seen an improvement. The process of cancer is so individual, down to the type of chemo delivered to every patient, to their reactions, to the support network surrounding them - and there’s a lot about cancer that never gets talked about - if you’re looking to support someone going through treatment or caring for someone who is, reach out to them. Don’t be afraid to be present for them. Illness can be so isolating, and sometimes it's hard to know what to say when someone is hurting and you don’t know how to fix it - but there is an amazing gift found in being with people, in sitting next to them in grief, or pain, or hardship, even if it’s on the other end of a phone call.
For now, we’re moving into a slow Christmas, and I can honestly say that’s ok. The world slowed down to a crawl this fall, time seemed to slip, and I’m not sure I remember most of August. But there is a gift in the quiet, a refocusing in time - and I’m content to just sit by the river and let it flow.
*Images and story posted with permission from my mama.
